First dropped at our consideration by the ever-observant Biking Spy, it seems Belgium’s Wout van Aert is testing an unorthodox time trial bike setup involving strong disc wheels each entrance and rear. This could have aero benefits, mirroring the setup most frequently seen on observe bikes. With only some days till the beginning of the Paris Olympics, and a gold medal on the road, the multidisciplinary rider is clearly trying to eke out any benefit over his opponents in an effort to safe a medal.
Van Aert’s Cervelo P5, a motorcycle that has just lately been up to date with some minor tweaks to the seat cluster together with wider tyre clearance, has been stripped again to uncooked carbon nearly totally with a view to save weight – paint over a complete bike can typically run into the a whole bunch of grams – which is much more of an element when operating a strong entrance wheel.
The time trial course for the Paris Olympics is kind of totally pan-flat, although twisty in locations. The added inertia of the entrance wheel might make it extra tough to manoeuvre, and will definitely make the entrance finish really feel stiffer, however it’s seemingly the features are well-studied and well worth the trade-off within the crew’s eyes.
The wheelset in query is the Reserve Infinity Disc Turbulent Aero, a wheelset designed particularly for Visma-Lease A Bike, however to our information, it’s but for use by the crew. It prices $4899, so maybe is simply rolled out for particular events. Van Aert curiously has his rear valve uncovered within the photographs we’ve seen, so he could also be experimenting with tyre stress for the course to totally optimise his setup. In accordance with the Reserve Wheels web site, “Wind tunnel assessments present a destructive drag coefficient of the entrance disc, which suggests after you have the wheel rolling, it is truly pulling the bike and rider ahead.”
As ever, it pays to dig by means of the feedback on Instagram, and a remark from a consumer stating that “I‘m gonna be disenchanted if Tarling doesn’t rock up with this set-up” has been preferred by none aside from Dan Bigham, maybe hinting that Van Aert won’t be the one rider we see with a double-disc setup for the large race.
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